Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Weekday Special: New Porsche Track Car – Except for the US


Rear window of Porsche's upcoming GT3 RS shows off the factory roll cage
c Porsche

The new GT3 RS is a continuation of the GT3 series of street-legal track-worthy 911s and will be released in October. The Porsche 911 GT3 RS features the same 3.6 liter 415 hp engine that the base GT3 has. The car is a lightweight version of the US legal GT3, shaving almost 45 pounds off of the already light GT3. It also features an adjustable wing and a full factory roll cage. Porsche shaved almost 45 pounds off of an already lightweight car and added a roll cage; that is impressive. It is likely that the roll cage is keeping the car from being imported into the US; the feds do not like to okay vehicles with roll cages.

The car comes with a lightened flywheel and a closer ratio transmission plus a fire extinguisher and racing seats. This is one heck of a weekend racer, for the very well healed. With a reported price of 94,280 British Pounds ($177,482) it makes for one expensive track car. Porsche has put a mini site on the web featuring this new car.

Hat Tip: the Autoblog

Saturday, May 27, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: Porsche Type Numbers – Part 2, Type 115 through Type 356

As the name states this is the second in a series of posts detailing the project numbers that Porsche has used. These project numbers are mostly chronological. As mentioned in Part 1 these project numbers are not to be confused with the somewhat confusing part numbers system.

Type 115
1939
Supercharged Kdf 1.1 liter engine overhead camshafts

Type 116
1938/39
Kdf backed 1.5 liter racing car with Type 114 components

Type 128
1940/41
Kdf based amphibian Schwimmwagen

Type 135
1940/41
130 Watt Wind power Generator

Type 136
1940/41
736 Watt Wind Generator

Type 137
1940/41
4500 Watt Wind Power Generator

Type 138
1940/41
Amphibian Schwimmwagen, alternative design

Type 160
1941
Design for Integral Body/Fraame for Kdf-Wagen

Type 166
1942/45
Kdf-Powered 4x4 Schwimmwagen, final design
Type 170
1942
Marine Sturmboot Engine, version 1

Type 171
1942
Marine Sturmboot Engine, version 2

Type 174
1942
Sturmboot Engine using Normal Kdf Engine

Type 175
1942
Steel Wheeled Military Tractor, the Ostradschlepper

Type 180
1942
Tank Design with Electric Transmission

Type 181
1942
Tank Design with Hydraulic Transmission

Type 205
1942
180 ton Tank, Maus

Type 212
1942
Air-Cooled 16-Cylinder Diesel Tank Engine

Type 245
1942
18-Ton Multi-Purpose Tank

Type 250
1942/43
Turretless Tank with 105 mm Gun

Type 285
1945
3.5 hp experimental Water Turbine

Type 293
1944
Personnel Carrier

Type 300
1944
Jet Engine to Power V-1 flying bomb "vengance weapon"

Type 309
1945
2-Stroke Diesel Engine for VW or Tractor

Type 312
1945
Gasoline Tractor

Type 313
1945
Diesel Tractor

Type 323
1946
11 hp Diesel Tractor

Type 328
1946
28-hp Tractor

Type 352
1946
Passenger car design for von Senger A.G., Switzerland

Type 356
1947
First Porsche Automobile, Open, Mid-Engined two-seater built with the VW as the basis
The link is to a Wikipedia photo of the actual first Porsche car


Source: Porsche Excellence Was Expected - The Complete Story of the Sports and Racing CarsKarl Ludvigsen1st Edition, 1977 pg. 517
2nd Edition, 2003 pg. 1484

The Ludvigsen work is an ongoing labor of love and a must read for any serious student of Porsche history.

Saturday, May 20, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: Porsche Type Numbers - Part 1, Type 7 through Type 114

This weeks Sunday Porsche Blogging subject is the Porsche numbering system for projects. Forget the part numbers, those are akin to a Dewey Decimal System for German engineers. This is the first of several lists of project numbers that will detail the surviving project numbers and what they involved. The numbering system for projects was a sequential chronological numbering system. The initial displayed project is seven because the first six never made it past the drawing boards.



Type 7
1930/31
Wanderer 1.86 liter chassis (1st design by Porsche office)

Type 8
1930/31
Wanderer 3.25 liter chassis

Type 9
1930/31
Supercharged version of type 8

Type 22
1932/37
Auto Union GP car

Type 52
1934
Auto Union sports car design

Type 60
1934/41
Kdf small car, later became the Volkswagen Beetle

Type 60K10
1939
Kdf sports coupe for Berlin to Rome Race

Type 62
1936
Kdf cross country, with open-sided body

Type 64
1937/38
Sports car, 1.5 liter, based on Kdf components

Type 66
1938
Kdf right-hand drive

Type 67
1939
Kdf listed as an "invalid vehicle"

Type 68
1939
Kdf panel van

Type 80
1938/39
Mercedes-Benz land speed record car

Type 82
1939/40
Kdf based Kubelwagen

Type 87
1939/41
Kubelwagen with 4-wheel drive

Type 100
1939/41
Tank prototype

Type 101
1942
Carrier for 88 mm gun with an electric transmission

Type 102
1942
Type 101 with hydraulic transmission

Type 108
1938
2-stage supercharger for Mercedes Benz

Type 110
1938/39
Small tractor, Volkspflug

Type 111
1939/40
Small tractor, new design

Type 112
1940/41
Larger-engined small tractor

Type 113
1941
Small tractor, third version

Type 114
1938/39
F. Wagen, a 1.5 liter sports car design

Source: Porsche Excellence Was Expected - The Complete Story of the Sports and Racing Cars
Karl Ludvigsen
1st Edition, 1977 pg. 517
2nd Edition, 2003 pg. 1484
The Ludvigsen work is an ongoing labor of love and a must read for any serious student of Porsche history.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: the Coming Porsche Panamera


c unknown
A third possible design for the upcoming Porsche Panamera

Porsche has been open about its plans to build a four door car beginning next year and according to Sybarites.org (Big Hat Tip to Autoblog) Porsche has started factory preparation for the new project. One of the Sybarites forum members has “informed” them that after discontinuing production of the Carrera GT at its Leipzig factory, Porsche has started preparing the factory for Panamera production. A four door Porsche is something that the firm has toyed with from time to time, even some early 911 design studies were for a four door vehicle. During the eighties and nineties the firm said that they would not produce a four door vehicle because it would interfere with the design work that they do for other automobile companies.

I am sure that some of the world’s Porsche purists will send up a great cry of despair over a Porsche four-door but I will not be one of them. Flying Debris has already commented on the reaction by Porsche purists to Porsche coming out with an SUV here. There are some people who deplore the fact that Porsche moved beyond what are referred to as the pre-A 356 models. Flying debris is happy that some of the rare Porsche parts that the factory still makes will likely still be manufactured, assuming that the Panamera doesn’t bomb.

c unknown
Another possible design for the upcoming Porsche Panamera

c unknown
One of the expected designs for the new Porsche Panamera

Sunday, May 07, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: A New Flying Debris Porsche Blog


c Sideline Sports Photography
'66 Porsche 911 prepped as a 911 R works the North Course at the Autobahn CC on April 2


The crack staff here at Flying Debris has organized all of the Sunday Porsche Blogging posts and assembled them on one handy web site, the originally named Sunday Porsche Blogging blog. Enjoy.

Sunday Porsche Blogging: Driving an Antique 911

As the photos below show, I have been driving a forty year old Porsche 911 on the race track. The car was set up very well by one the best shops for such cars here in the US, Ecurie Engineering, of Mequon, WI. Due to the care that the car had in setting up the suspension it is a very stable race car. In fact the car is likely far more stable than when it was originally raced. It was raced during the ‘60s and the early ‘70s. When the car was raced it was set up as a 911 T/S with the wider tires and corresponding fenders; in addition, late in its career it acquired a now ubiquitous whale tail (the last tail it used was actually known among Porsche geeks as the tea-tray tail). The person I purchased the car from had restored it to its current configuration, as a 911R. The 911R was a very rare race vehicle that was mostly used in FIA Rallies. The car employed a twin-plug version of the 2.0 liter (1991 cc) 911 engine, the type 901/23; it is the 911 version of the successful 906 race engine.

Set up as a 911R the car is a handful. Unlike modern cars, even race cars, this antique does not have any boost in the steering mechanism; so the driver is essentially controlling a constant battle between the steering wheel and the accelerator pedal. Too much of either one will send the car into an immediate spin, a condition known as being “tail happy” or oversteer. The car currently has a small racing steering wheel, the better to stay away from the roll cage, but I can see why the car was originally delivered with a huge steering wheel, a little more leverage can’t hurt and the old-time roll cages weren’t in the way of anything. The difference between the ’66 race car and a modern sports car is like night and day, primarily because of the steering, you simply do not need to muscle a modern car around the track. It gives one a lot a respect for those old time race drivers; and I’m not even talking about the mortality rates that they faced.

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 30, 2006

c Sideline Sports Photography

More Work on the North Course of ACC April 1

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 30, 2006

C Sideline Sports Photography


Working the North Course at the Autobahn Country Club in a '66 911 on April 1

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 30, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: Sloan Cars, the Low Mileage Porsche Place


c Sloan Cars


Jerry Seinfeld's 7100 mile '97 Turbo S; at $225,000 the celebrity status likely doesn't add more than $25,000 to $50,000 to the Jerry Seinfeld's 7100 mile '97 Turbo S: at $225,000 the celebrity status likely doesn't add more than $25,000 to $50,000 to the price of this uber-rare air cooled classic.

The June issue of Hemmings Sports & Exotic Magazine has a great article (not yet on the web) about Richard Sloan and his passion for collecting low mileage and oddly optioned Porsches. His passion for those low mileage (mostly) 911s has lead him to start a business catering to those who want very low mileage used sports cars. It seems odd but some people don’t drive their Porsches, sometimes they are initially intimidated by the car and put it away, sometimes they have so many cars or do so little driving that they do not rack up many miles on any one vehicle, sometimes they plan not to drive the vehicle or it even falls through the cracks (what a problem!). His business, Sloan Cars in New Haven Connecticut has been advertising in Excellence Magazine for several years but the article about the collection/business is interesting in that it brings out tidbits like a relatively high mileage, at 30,000 miles, ’79 911 Turbo in beautiful Minerva Blue that had the $2000 (in 1979 dollars) optional color matching Blaupunkt radio control stick. Or his never titled ’97 Carrera with 450 miles on the clock. No doubt the cars are expensive, but when he says that this may be the most original, low mileage 914 on the planet, he may be right; other than some copies squirreled away in European museums. So if you are in the market for a low mileage original Porsche and you have the financial wherewithal, definitely head on out to New Haven and talk to Richard Sloan, just bring your checkbook.

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris April 23, 2006.




Sunday Porsche Blogging: Old News, Porsche Buys 20% of VW

Porsche, a publicly traded German company recently bought 20% of Volkswagen Group in what some thought a surprise. Many wrote how the purchase helped to ensure further chassis work and R&D cooperation. The purchase may also the influence the statist ideas of the Lower Saxony government, a sizable shareholder. There was also the threat of Stuttgart neighbor Mercedes buying into VW. Additional threats come from opening up the company. The family firm founded by former VW CEO Ferdinand Piech’s mother, Porsche Salzburg, still is the VW importer to Austria and points east. That arrangement would be less likely to continue with outside involvement.

The Mercedes threat is one that is almost genetic, Mercedes fired Porsche founder Ferdinand Porsche in the ‘20s and blamed him for some manufacturing problems that they were experiencing at the time. It is said that the Porsche family has held a grudge ever since. When Porsche was looking for a partner to share the development costs of a new SUV they negotiated with Mercedes until Mercedes suggested that they take a share of Porsche in order to consummate the deal. Porsche Chairman Wendell Weideking walked out of the room. He knew that the Porsche and Piech families would never agree to such an arrangement.

A further Porsche genetic issue is the fact that Volkswagen was formed to build the car that we’ve come to know as the Beetle, a car entirely designed by Ferdinand Porsche and his engineering firm. In negotiations after WWII between Porsche and the Occupying Allies, the Porsche engineering firm received 1 German Deutschmark for every Beetle to be sold world-wide. This was payment for the prewar design work on the Beetle. Porsche has continued to do extensive amounts of design work for VW over the years. Porsche also shared design and manufacturing work with VW on the ill fated 914, a car whose unibody price was increased after a change in VW leadership, leaving Porsche without price control for a large portion of their product. That quickly doomed the wonderful but high priced 914-6; the standard 914 used a Porsche-breathed-on VW engine, as did a succession of the lowest priced Porsches. Porsche did not want to face this again with their very successful Cayenne line. The Cayenne shares its unibody with the VW Touareg. There were such rumblings last year concerning the VW engine used in the base model Cayenne, VW insinuated that it would stop building the engine that Porsche buys from them. For some family members it was 1968 all over again.

Since the early nineties when it looked like Porsche would go bankrupt or be swallowed up by another car company Porsche has radically changed their manufacturing processes. The company eagerly took the best of Japanese manufacturing prowess and added their own Germanic touches. They have also become very adept at exploiting the markets that they sell to. The cost of designing a new car has become so enormous that one failed vehicle could’ve put a small company like Porsche out of business. Since those dark days of the early ‘90s Porsche has successfully launched 3 new 911 Carrera models (1 air-cooled, 2 water-cooled, each having as many as 20+ variations), 2 models each of the Boxster and the Boxster S, the SUV Cayene (currently 4 variations), the new Cayman (a Boxster derivative) and in 2 years they plan to release a 4-door sedan named the Panamera. Add to that a very successful customer racing program. It is too early to judge the success of the Cayman but all of the other vehicles have been financial successes.

The Porsche management has struck me as prudent in the extreme; I doubt that they would take such a big risk if they didn’t believe in the future of VW. As the share prices for many auto companies are taking a beating Porsche likely sees value in VW at these price levels. They have also greatly aided their own business.

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 16, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging – Why the Cayenne is a Good Thing for Porsche

Due to time spent at the track the Porsche blogging is once again light. So light that I am linking to a post by another blogger; the Truth About Cars guy. He is rightly peeved at Porschephiles who make snide (and worse) remarks about the Cayenne, the Porsche SUV. His editorial can be found here. My experience with the brand has shown me that I want them to make money. Surprisingly there are parts for older street cars that Porsche no longer produces. Now I can see not producing the body panels for a low volume special but the starter switch for pre-1968 911s? When Porsche was at its nadir I was seriously worried about the supply of parts; if the company won’t produce a starter switch what will an OEM company decline to produce?

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 9, 2006.

Sunday Porsche Blogging: A Decades Spanning Photo


Four Decades of Porsche Technology on Display at the Autobahn CC Paddock Sunday Morning
c Flying Debris

From an early 911 through the latest supercar, the Autobahn Country Club had a museum worth of Porsches on track this weekend.

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Sunday April 2, 2006

If You're Going to Get Pulled Over, Be a Rich Guy in Italy


c rssportscars
But Officer, I Thought That the Sign Said 200 mph!

Italian telecom executive Riccardo Ruggiero told the local police that he was just putting his new Porsche Carrera GT “through its paces” when he was pulled over doing 193 mph. The 357 Euro fine seems like quite a deal considering the lousy excuse he gave to the cop.

This post originally appeared on Flying Debris Tuesday March 21, 2006. So it isn't even a Sunday post, but its worth throwing in.

Sunday Porsche Blogging: Very Light This Week


Tight Urban Garage, and Glad to Have It
c Flying Debris

Due to ongoing issues with Blogger discussed here, the weekly Porsche Blogging is light, the time that I would normally have spent writing has been spent dealing with ongoing posting issues. There are also more parade photos to be posted; hopefully Blogger will get it together soon. Ther above photo shows what urban car nuts have to put up with. In this case it is the garage of a Porsche fan, thus giving me an excuse to call it Porsche Blogging

This post initially appeared on Flying Debris Sunday March 19, 2006

Sunday Porsche Blogging: the New Porsche Turbocharger

As Porsche prepares to release its new type 997 Turbo, they are starting to show the car off to the press. The Porsche factory magazine Christophorus has an interesting piece on the turbocharger itself(1). The new turbocharged version of the 911 Carrera utilizes one of the fifteen pound devices on each of the two exhaust streams, one on each side of the flat six cylinder engine. For this new car Porsche has developed the first turbocharger to be used in a gasoline engine that uses variable-turbine geometry, meaning that the turbocharger is always working and thus ready to immediately increase power by working harder. This is a big deal.

The turbocharger for piston engines was patented by Swiss engineer Alfred Buchi in 1905, a time when the full potential of the device was not realized due to the materials available back then. Turbochargers increase power by increasing the amount of the air/fuel mixture consumed by the engine; they greatly increase the amount of air forced into the intake manifold. This attribute of higher manifold pressure was the attraction for one of its first major applications; piston airplane engines used in the low pressure environment of high altitude before and during WWII.

Turbochargers work by placing a powered impellor rotating at very high speeds that acts as a compressor in the path of the air going into the engine, thus increasing the airflow’s speed and pressure. If the impeller was powered by a belt off of the engine it would be a supercharger, or Kompressor in Mercedes-speak. Instead the turbocharger saves engine power by using a shaft attached to an impellor placed in the fast moving, highly heated stream of exhaust gasses. This proximity to the exhaust has caused serious heat issues with turbochargers over the years; that combined with the fact that compressed air heats up are the reasons that intercoolers have been so popular with turbocharged applications. It is desirable both in terms of power output and engine longevity to have a cooler fuel/air input charge.

Diesel engines have used turbochargers for years; this makes sense as diesels are powered by pressure driven explosions in the cylinders. Exhaust gas temperatures of Diesel engines run cooler than Otto (gasoline) engines, 1350 degrees F vs. 1850 degrees F, making the construction of turbocharging devices easier in the diesel world. Diesels have been using turbochargers with variable turbine technology for some time now due to the lower temperature environment; the metallurgy was not all that expensive as there already were jet engine and space travel applications. The differing expansion rate of different metals was the difficult problem that Porsche engineers had to surmount in order to build this new turbocharger.

When I first heard about this variable-turbine geometry I assumed that variable part referred to the actual vanes on the exhaust impeller, with the vanes changing their angles of attack depending on how forceful the passing gasses are. In fact it refers to a device that directs the exhaust stream through the impellers. The device, consisting of eleven small blades, expands like tiny lobster tails into the exhaust stream to capture more of the exhaust stream at times when the exhaust stream is less powerful, i.e. lower RPMs. By contrast the device retracts to capture less of the stream at higher engine speeds due the lower relative power needs to keep the turbocharger impeller spinning at optimum levels. This is the portion of the turbocharger that needed the metallurgy breakthroughs.

This is a big deal because it allows the turbocharger to spin at optimum levels at a wider range of engine speeds, especially low speeds. Traditional turbochargers need higher engine speeds with the corresponding higher exhaust gas speeds in order to spin fast enough to push the amount of air needed to boost the intake pressure. This often produced dramatic “turbo lag”, the time that the turbocharger took to spool up fast enough to make a difference to the engine’s power output. In some cars the power would come on with such a surge that the driver needed some skill to control the vehicle. Because the exhaust can account for a loss of up to thirty-percent of an engine’s power, the turbocharger allows the engine to capture some of this lost power and put it to use, allowing for a smaller, lighter and more efficient engine relative to power output. The turbo lag problem has been a definite marketing issue, a smaller engine that doesn’t get good power until it reaches 3000 RPM and then has a rush of power is much less comfortable to use than a larger engine that puts out good usable power at lower engine speeds but gets worse gas mileage. In addition to being more efficient fuel wise, the smaller engine also weighs less, another efficiency that leads to better gas mileage. The smaller size also offers a host of other advantages including engine placement.

This new Porsche turbocharger is a big deal because it dramatically advances turbocharger technology and if this new technology can be produced in a cost efficient manner it seems likely that we will see more, and more usable turbocharged automobiles. This technology could lower the amount of energy that we use for each mile traveled. The new Porsche turbocharger also has a usable range large enough to find use in the gas engine portion of hybrid vehicles, making those vehicles even more efficient.

(1)Christophorus, The Porsche Magazine; number 318, February/March 2006, pages 16-27

This post initially appeared on Flying Debris Sunday March 12, 2006.

Sunday Porsche Blogging: The type 987 Coupe, the New Porsche Cayman S

I was lucky enough to test drive the new Porsche Cayman S in mid January at Loeber Motors in Lincolnwood, IL. That car is an apex eater; I can only imagine what the Cayman would be like through the Carrousel at Road America. The car feels like it just wants to go faster through turns. After looking the car over for about fifteen minutes I got to climb into a black model with 18 miles on the odometer and fire it up. The interior is comfortable and definitely advanced from my ’02 Boxster S. When you sit in the car it feels solid, especially when the door closes. The transmission is wonderful; the shifter is placed correctly, with shorter throws than either of the previous Boxster models and it is very, very smooth. Here was a mid-engine car with 18 miles on the clock and the transmission felt as smooth as silk. When the engine is fired up the interior fills with the fabulous sound of the new 3.4 liter flat-six engine directly behind you. At least at low speeds the engine sounds better inside the car than outside of it. That is as it should be; the passerby is not making the payments on the thing.

My test drive was in a rather crowded urban area so I took the car out to a nearby highway clover leaf and was able to do several “laps” through the entire Touhy Ave. clover leaf at relatively high speeds. Because it was winter there was debris on the edges of the ramps and on a few of those passes I intentionally put the inside wheels on this gravelly debris in an effort to unsettle the car. The Cayman would have none of that; it just give a hint of slip before once again settling into its attack the corner mode. The car that I drove was equipped with PSM, the Porsche yaw control system and if PSM did kick in, I never noticed it.

The car that I drove was not equipped with the Sport Chrono option, which in addition to putting a stop watch on your dashboard, gives you a sportier shift pattern when it’s engaged. Further, when the Sport Chrono package is combined with the GPS package and its space hogging screen you will be able to record lap and split times in the GPS system. Very cool.

The Cayman S is a type 987, as are the current two Boxster models, the Boxster and the Boxster S. The initial Boxster models, the standard and the S, built through 2004 were type 986 models. The Boxster models have always shared components with their more expensive Carrera siblings, the 996s and the new 997s, thus the numerical designations of 986 and 987.Building this car is an interesting marketing decision; Porsche has shown that they understand the market they operate in and they have been able to successfully exploit that knowledge. Mercedes and Lexus have shown that there is a market for a $60,000 two-seater and Porsche saw that niche as missing a truly sporting component. Porsche feels that they can fill that niche with a vehicle that shares enough with the existing Boxster line to make even relatively limited production a profitable endeavor. The shame about the mid-engine Porsche line up is the lack of racing experience. It has been said that Porsche does not want their expensive and profitable Carrera streetcars and GT3 race program to be at all shown up by the less expensive Boxsters.

The Cayman is interesting in the race aspect because the thing is a track car, right out of the box. When the Sport Chrono and GPS goodies are thrown in, the car appears to be perfect for people who get in a decent amount of track time. If guys start taking these cars out to places like the Autobahn Country Club and whooping up on Carreras, then it may be tough to keep the Cayman off of the track. I would like to add that I do not know whether the Cayman S can take the Carrera, I would rather not hazard a guess. There were rumors, later quashed by the factory, that implied the Cayman S was faster than the Carrera in testing at the Nurburgring.

Further Flying Debris Porsche Blogging can be found here, here, and here.

Sunday Porsche Blogging – type 951 the Porsche 944 Turbo


951 on Lake Geneva
c Flying Debris

The above photo is of an old car of mine, a 1987 Porsche 944 Turbo; the Porsche factory number for that car is the 951. That shot was taken on Lake Geneva in Wisconsin, about a mile or two off of the bar Chuck’s in Fontana. The University of Chicago’s Yerkes Observatory is in the far background. A few of us had gone up to go ice boating and there wasn’t enough wind so I just had to drive around the lake in a Porsche.

That 951 was in many ways a wonderful car, although it did have a few expensive repair bills. When properly driven the car is incredibly fast, smooth and quick; for the inexperienced the turbocharged nature of the car can be dangerous. I probably would’ve kept the car for the long-term (I had it for 7 years) if I drove more. As the screen name implies I take public transportation to work everyday. Lately I’ve been putting about 3000 to 5000 total miles per year on a few vehicles. That’s what city living can do for you, not only can I walk to a grocery store and restaurants, but I can walk to Home Depot and Office Depot; the down side is that parking is ridiculous.

The Porsche 944 Turbo (951) is often on lists of relatively inexpensive but relatively exotic sports cars, excellent examples of pre-1988½ can be found well under $15,000. Even the more powerful 1988½ and later cars are now in that $15,000 range. As those magazine articles often point out, it is critical to get a well maintained vehicle. A point to pay particular attention to is the proper maintenance of the timing belts. The factory replacement schedule must be religiously followed, including follow-up adjustments. Another area to check is the motor mounts, they are made of some hard rubber-like compound and they wear out from use and age. Not only are they expensive to replace but as they wear out the engine movement endangers the torque tube, the torque tube is the drive shaft in this rear transaxle car and is not inexpensive.

The last 951 was last sold new in the US in 1990, so all of these cars are at least 16 years old and any 16 year old car will have parts that break and Porsche parts are expensive, as is service. Figure dealer shop rates at $100 per hour and private shop rates somewhere in the $60 per hour range. My advice on these and any older Porsche street car has included “be ready to spend $5000 on your car at any time, you may never have to spend it but you should always be prepared to spend it.” For an air cooled 911 a rebuild starts at about $7000. The reality of a nice $12,000 951 is that it should be seen as a $20,000 car, not only realistic but really quite a deal. It may take years to spend the extra $8000 budgeted but it will get spent.

Another great point about the 951 is that they can be dramatically improved; the bottom end of the straight-four engine is rock solid and can take much bigger forces than those it normally faces. Additionally the turbo and controlling software can easily be modified, allowing for huge power increases. Due to the car’s race history there are plenty of products to improve the power, the handling, the transmission and anything else that you could imagine, or pay for. At the 1999 24 hour race at Daytona there was a team running a 1987 street 951 that had been modified for racing. The car finished, it didn’t win anything but it finished the 24 hours. That 951 had been a well used 12 year old street car that was rebuilt and went out and took on the world’s best, not bad.

The 951 is wonderful on the highway, when Road & Track first reviewed the car they recorded the fastest highway passing times that the magazine had yet recorded. I can attest to those findings, at high speeds the car feels like it settles down (the aerodynamics give the car fantastic down force) and with proper use of the turbocharger (through throttle control and judicious gear changes) it will go from 80 to 110 in what seems like an instant. Visibility and stability of the car give the driver great confidence at high speed, the car just feels rock solid at speed. The best gas mileage that I ever got was 32 mpg., all highway driving between 60 and 80 mph.

The interior of the car is snug but comfortable and it looks fairly modern, in ’86 it was the fist car to have driver and passenger air bags as standard equipment. The ergonomics are great for me; I can reach and see all of the controls and gauges. However, I have heard complaints from others concerning their view of the gauges. The car is a hatch-back so it is very practical; I put 8’ 2x4s through the hatch and into the passenger foot well. The 951 is a 2 + 2, meaning that it has rear seats; these fold down seats would be great for kids if you could put a child’s seat into them. I didn’t try all that hard, but I never did find a seat that fit. I’m not sure if they still use the term but Porsche once referred to their rear seats as “occasional seats”, you don’t want to sit in those things, even occasionally.

Overall I would recommend the 951 as a great car as long as one accepts its limitations and costs. It is a car that I would buy again, if I was in a situation where I often found myself on highways. I would also suggest swapping the wheels for the 17” 5-spoke Carrera Cup2 wheels; they improve and update the looks dramatically. A great spot for a CD changer is under the rear carpet in the area behind the wheel well. The car also makes a great race car; after all it is directly derived from the 924 GTP that raced in the 1981 Le Mans 24 Hour race and during its production run Porsche also turned out a variety of racing versions of the 951.

Further Porsche Blogging at Flying Debris can be found here and here.

Bobby Rahal Drives the "Hippy Car"


Rahal's Ride!
c Flying Debris

This post was never actually labelled as a Sunday Porsche Blogging post but it deserves inclusion as the first true Porsche post on Flying Debris. In addition it was written on a holiday Monday.


This is one of my favorite race cars of early ‘70s, the Porsche 917. 25 of these cars were built for the ’69 sports car season; they were very fast but notoriously untamed. Porsche test driver Hans Herman once said of the early 917 “Often I really believed that my next resting place would be in heaven.”1 The ’69 Le Mans 24 hour race was the closest Le Mans ever. Yet the excitingly close finish was between a Porsche 908 driven by the 41 year old Herman and a Ford GT40, driven by a 24 year old Jacky Ickx; the vaunted 917 was not involved in the chase for the checkered flag. The Ford won after a final lap that featured several lead changes being reported back to the packed grandstands from the 8.365 mile course.

The next year, 1970 saw a 917L race at Le Mans with this fantastic Martini Racing livery that inspired observers to dub it the “hippie car” for its beautiful swirling paint job. The “hippie car” took second place in the rain soaked Le Mans of 1970 with Gerard Larrousse and Willibert Kauhsen at the wheel. The winning car was the 917K entered by Porsche Salzburg, the firm owned by Louise Porsche Piech. Louise was the daughter of Porsche founder Ferdinand Porsche, the older sister of then Porsche Chairman Ferry Porsche and mother of 906 designer and later Volkswagen Audi Group Chairman, Ferdinand Piech. Her story is a wonderful one in itself. I once read an interview with her in which she said “I’ve only ever driven my family’s cars. First the cars of my father, then those of my brother, and now those of my son.”2

The fact that Louise had such a hot car in the 1970 race while customers Martini Racing and Team Gulf chased her car didn’t sit very well with the customers. On the other hand it was Louise who kept Porsche going both as the head of the firm and by moving supplies and funds through the various Allied Occupation Zones in the early post WWII period. During much of that time both her father and her brother were being held as economic war criminals in France due to the pre-war and war-time activities of Porsche, Ing. The engineering firm could count the Volkswagen Beetle and the King Tiger tank among their war related projects. An exasperating factor is the fact that Ferdinand Porsche, in his roll at the bizarrely named KdF (Kraft Durch Freude; the Nazi conglomerates’ name in German, translates as Strength Through Joy) had authority over the Peugeot factories during the German occupation of France. Needless to say, Peugeot, a previously proud French firm, was not turning out smartly elegant French cars while under the thumb of KdF. The area between where the Porsche family was living, Zell Am See and the firm’s base in Gmund was split by the post war authorities. German men had a much tougher time crossing between those zones than German women, giving Louise an advantage over the other early Porsche employees. It was an advantage that the young Porsche firm needed, for without that help it is likely that the firm would have lost many key employees to other opportunities.

The photo above shows the “hippy car” after being run on a Saturday afternoon by Bobby Rahal in July of 2002. The shot was taken in the pits at Road America in Elkhart Lake, WI. during the Brian Redman International Challenge (BRIC). The BRIC has been renamed the Kohler International Challenge with Brian Redman; KICBR doesn’t really work so it will likely still be called the BRIC. It is an annual vintage auto race held in July at the Kettle Moraine area race track, the longest road course in the US. The BRIC is also one of the largest vintage races in the country and is always a great time. The nearby towns of Elkhart Lake and Plymouth are nice Midwestern farming towns that have enough economic activity to still be described as thriving. They are the quintessential dairy towns of middle Wisconsin, a real throwback.

1 Porsche Excellence Was Expected by Karl Ludvigsen 1st Edition 1977 pg. 660 2nd Edition 2003 pg. 583
2 Excellence Magazine #143, Dec. 2005 pg. 82

This post originally appeared Monday February 20, 2006.